Sonali Senaratna Sellamuttu

Sonali is Senior Researcher and Head of Office for the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) in Southeast Asia. She has over 16 years of experience working on sustainable livelihoods and poverty aspects as they relate to natural resource management, like those of communities impacted by hydropower development. Sonali has also worked on wetlands and livelihoods issues and was the IWMI Representative on Ramsar’s Scientific and Technical Review Panel (STRP) for 2013-2015, in addition to being the Lead for the STRP Working Group on Wetlands and Poverty Eradication (2013-2015). She is currently the Co-Chair for the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) Asia-Pacific Regional Assessment (2015-2018).

Resettlement schemes are meant to improve the lives of those who are resettled, but sometimes this change brings about livelihood problems for relocated villagers. Considering the gender dynamics of the groups being relocated may help.